Mother's Day 2024

On Saturday while Davis and I were camping, Daryl and the other boys took Grandmommy to lunch to celebrate Mother's Day. 

Sunday after Davis and I got home, the family spent several hours relaxing in the pool and then the boys all took me out for ice cream. 

 

Wesley Baseball Game

 Wesley had a big milestone over the weekend. He drove himself to the Rays game in St Petersburg to meet up with his girlfriend Lydia. Lydia is a friend he knew back at Carver Middle in Fruitland Park. 

Week in Review

The first Sunday of the month, I worshipped with Cleveland UMC in Punta Gorda and got to preside over communion. 

Thursday Daryl's church hosted us for clergy gathering again - and the band was made up of clergy and laity from Cypress Lake UMC in Fort Myers and Trinity UMC in Bradenton. 

Our special guests were the heads of our Florida delegation for General Conference, Rev. Alex Shanks and Molly McEntire. 

Here we are celebrating those graduating this month: myself with my DMin from Garrett; Kris Wise with his MDiv from Candler; Robert Bledsoe with his DMin from Duke; and Kalyn and Grady Wiley with their MDivs from Duke. 

Then that night Alex and Molly hosted a gathering for laity as an update from General Conference at Christ Community UMC in Punta Gorda. 

 

Furry Friends

These two love to snuggle - and right now their favorite spot to snuggle together is on Parker's bed while he is playing video games. 

 

Space Center Camping

For Mother's Day weekend, the Boy Scout Troop went to the Space Center. Davis and I went along. We camped at the Kars Park on Merritt Island, which is a part of the NASA property. The campsite was right alongside the Indian River Lagoon. We got there late on Friday night and set up in the dark. 

Saturday morning in the light. Such a pretty view. You could also see Port Canaveral in the distance. 

The Space Center has changed a lot even since our last family visit in 2020. Davis and I had a lot of fun exploring. 

We took the bus trip out to the Apollo/Saturn building and it went past the Vehicle Assembly Building.

After exploring, we took the bus back and went into the new Gateway building about new space exploration. We even rode one of the Mars simulators. 

And then it was time to explore the Atlantis building and the shuttle launch experience. That simulator is about 3x as serious as the Mission Space experience at Disney. 

And we got to meet an astronaut! 

He is the research manager for the International Space Station at Kennedy. 

He flew on one of the early Challenger shuttle missions.